Muse Boards

Louis Vuitton Cruise 2016

Louis Vuitton

Resort 2016

Since taking the reigns as creative director of France’s most storied fashion house Louis Vuitton, Nicolas Ghesquière has approached each of the brand’s cruise collections – so far four, in total – as opportunities to transport show-goers to an entirely new world.

Posted January 28th, 2018By
Colby Mugrabi

From a colorful collection shown in Monaco in 2014, to architecturally significant sites such as John Launder’s Bob Hope House in Palm Springs, to Brazilian architect Oscar Niemeyer’s Niteroi Contemporary Art Museum in Rio de Janeiro, and most recently the Miho Museum in southeast Kyoto, Japan, designed by I.M. Pei, each cruise collection has been a physical and visual journey, a absolute treat for the senses. While analyzing each show leaves you in a similar headspace to the never-ending chicken or the egg conundrum – was the show site decided upon first and the clothing and accessories designed second? OR, was the show venue chosen after the collection had begun to take shape? – this is only because season after season the two facets fit so harmoniously together.

Though each cruise show contains highlights of their own, a personal favorite of the four in focus was Ghesquière’s show for cruise 2016, held at the John Lautner-designed Bob Hope House in Palm Springs, California (also mentioned here). In this case, the setting’s iconic architecture played to a much broader design narrative, which intertwined incredibly well with the season’s clothing, shoes and accessories. First, Lautner’s unorthodox use of shapes and materials – the house’s mammoth, rounded roof of poured concrete and curved rectangular panels of glass, for example – were echoed in Ghesquière’s unorthodox design pairings, formal wear worn with desert boots, tailored jackets in shiny neoprene and tiny trunks paired with matching purses. Proportions tended to err on the side of exaggerated, seen in the show’s countless maxi-skirts and super short shorts, while Ghesquière expanded on some newly developed codes of the French house, all while incorporating classic design touches through the use of iconic patterns and materials; a perfect marriage of the past, present and future of design, only to be seen through the creative eyes of Nicolas Ghesquière.